Characteristics of Science:
Understanding Scientists and their Work
Prof. Michael Clough & the ISU CCLI team
What is science? How does science work? What are scientists like? Most people have given little thought
to these sorts of questions, yet often possess surprisingly entrenched misconceptions of each. These
strongly held opinions are often formed from everyday media portrayals of science and scientists found in
movies, television programs, commercials and advertisements, and popular literature. As you might
expect, both the media and secondary-school science often inaccurately portray what authentic science
and scientists are like.
To help you better understand the characteristics of science, in this course you will read several short
stories that accurately reflect how scientific knowledge was developed and came to be accepted.
Comments and questions are embedded in these stories to draw your attention to accurate ideas regarding
the characteristics of science. However, your prior ideas regarding what science is, how science is done,
and what scientists are like may easily cause you to miss important lessons about the characteristics of
science. To help you get the most out of the stories and accurately interpret what they are illustrating
about science, the following overview is intended to assist you in recognizing misconceptions regarding
the characteristics of science that you may possess.
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Referring to and keeping these characteristics of science in mind when reading the stories
that are assigned will help you better understand what science and scientists are like, and
how doing science is more interesting than you may have previously thought.
Scientists Will Employ Whatever Methods They Find Useful for Understanding the Natural World
Perhaps the most pervasive misconception regarding the characteristics of science is that scientists follow
a step-by-step scientific method when conducting research. While scientists do reason through problems,
the variety of methods they use result from a number of factors — the kind of phenomena being explored,
the specific problem at hand, existing scientific knowledge and thinking, available resources,
serendipitous events, and the investigator’s preferences, imagination and creativity. This is why the
physicist and Nobel Laureate, Percy Bridgman, once claimed that “the scientific method, insofar as it is a
method, is nothing more than doing one's damnedest with one's mind, no holds barred”. Scientists tend to
use whatever methods and approaches that will shed insight onto a research problem.
For instance, many well-established science ideas did not come about from experiments. Experiments are
often useful in science, but they have limits. Some of the most fundamental ideas in science were not
developed or established through conducting experiments, but by other means such as observation, model
building, and other approaches. In some fields of science, conducting experiments or having an
experimental control is not even possible. Even in scientific disciplines where experiments are prevalent,
the notion of a rigid scientific method simply does not reflect what actual scientists do.
Doing Science Well Requires Imagination and Creativity
Nobel Laureate Peter Medawar argued that although scientific papers are written in a manner to best
communicate and persuade readers of the logic behind the reported work, the format implies to nonscientists that researchers actually follow a step-by-step method. Left out of scientific papers are the
hunches, dead ends, creative insights, extensive discussions, and other occurrences that make clear
science is a human process. What remains implies that scientists follow a step-by-step scientific method.
Conveying a definite structure to scientific methodology wrongly leads students to think that experiments
are the only route to understanding the natural world, that imagination and creativity play little if any role
in research, that the success of science is due to a purely logical step-by-step method, and that this method
separates science from other disciplines. Actual research is far messier and demands imagination and
creativity to generate ideas never before considered.
Einstein once remarked that imagination is more important than knowledge for that is where novelty
arises. He claimed that his ideas regarding relativity emerged from his imagining what riding on a beam
of light would be like. John Dewey once said that “Every great advance in science has issued from a new
audacity of imagination.” As you read the stories, look for how imagination and creativity are the engine
of scientific advance and indispensible for its success.
The Generation and Acceptance of Scientific Knowledge Often Takes a Long Time
The media and science textbooks often give the impression that credible scientific ideas were generated
and accepted rather quickly. But typically much time passes as questions are conceived, ideas are put
forward, debated, modified, become credible, and are eventually accepted by the scientific community. A
variety of reasons account for the length of time required for scientific questions to be confidently
answered.
Sometimes asking the precise question that will lead to productive research can be very challenging and a
long time may pass pursuing unproductive questions. Moreover, unlike most school laboratory
experiences, scientists conducting authentic research do not have a set of instructions to follow in
pursuing their questions. The data do not tell scientists what to think. Rather, scientists must determine
what data are significant and generate ideas that will make sense of the data. Once generated, ideas must
be persuasive to the community of scientists who do research in that area.
Importantly, scientists do not vote on what the natural world is like. The well-known vote among
astronomers in 2006 to reclassify Pluto as dwarf planet was simply a vote on how to classify the object.
Consider how absurd and problematic voting on what the natural world is like would be! All in favor of
gravitation say “Yay”, all opposed say “nay”? Motion passes 57% to 43%? How would the dividing line
between passage and failure be determined?
In authentic science, ideas emerge and are accepted gradually, as scientists are persuaded that an idea is
valid. As further research evidence and reasoning supports such ideas, they become so widely accepted by
the researchers in the relevant field of research that as the paleontologist Stephen J. Gould put it,
withholding provisional consent would be perverse. Young researchers are educated in the new way of
thinking and eventually that way of thinking is accepted as the way nature is.
Remember that scientists have no higher authority to seek out and ensure whether they are asking the
most productive questions, are pursuing them appropriately, have correctly analyzed their data, and
whether or not they have reached correct conclusions. Figuring all this out is what makes doing science so
interesting and challenging. As Einstein noted, if all these decisions were straightforward and quick, “it
wouldn't be called research, would it?”
Science Has a Subjective Aspect
Because science is a human endeavor, subjectivity or preconceived notions cannot be eliminated. The
knowledge scientists bring to their research influences what questions they ask, how they go about
pursuing answers to those questions, what data is deemed relevant and irrelevant, and what kinds of
answers are plausible. Knowledge, as well as being a product of investigations, is also a tool for making
further observations and deriving new knowledge. What scientists think and see is necessarily influenced
by the previous thinking they bring to bear on their research.
A more realistic view of how scientists and the scientific community work to check, but not eliminate
subjectivity, includes an understanding of private science, public science, and their interactions. Private
science refers to the inspiration, intuition, imagination and creative leaps that individual scientists make.
These processes and ideas can easily result in unwarranted conclusions and unexamined biases, but the
process of publicly sharing ideas with the larger community of scientists acts to constrain subjectivity as
methodologies and biases are examined and modified by the views of other scientists. Public science
tempers, without eliminating, the subjective tendencies of private science.
Well-Established Science Knowledge is Durable, but Always Open to Revision
Knowledge about the natural world is not discovered like finding your lost key cars. Much effort,
imagination, creativity and time is required to generate credible ideas and for those ideas to be accepted
by the scientific community. Many people wrongly think of well-established scientific knowledge as
proven truth, but this misses the important point that scientists can never know if they have the absolute
truth of the matter (remember, they have no higher authority who can confirm their ideas). Science
teachers often perpetuate this view by using words like “prove” and “true” without making clear to
students what they mean in a science context. Einstein and Infeld provide an easily understood analogy:
In our endeavor to understand reality we are somewhat like a man trying to understand the mechanism of a
closed watch. If he is ingenious he may form some picture of a mechanism which could be responsible for
all the things he observes, but he may never be quite sure his picture is the only one which could explain
his observations. He will never be able to compare his picture with the real mechanism and he cannot even
imagine the possibility or the meaning of such a comparison.
Because the “watch” can never be opened, asking whether our ideas concerning the natural world are
absolutely true is to ask an unanswerable question.
However unlikely, even the most cherished and well-established scientific knowledge could, in principle,
be revised or replaced. That scientific knowledge is open to revision is one of the great strengths of
science as a way of knowing. That even well-established scientific knowledge is not proven truth and thus
potentially open to revision should not result in a loss of confidence in that knowledge. Well-established
scientific knowledge is so well supported that withholding provisional consent would be ridiculous. And
the many technologies responsible for lengthening our lives and easing everyday difficulties are built
upon that well-established scientific knowledge. While we have good reason to place great confidence in
well-established science ideas, all science knowledge is created by human beings and is thus always open
to revision with new evidence and thinking.
Well-Established Science Ideas Are Not Easily Abandoned
That well-established scientific knowledge is potentially open to revision does not mean such knowledge
is easily changed – and for good reason! Unsolved puzzles and seemingly refuting evidence do not always
result in rejection of an idea. Widely encompassing scientific ideas are always faced with anomalies—
phenomena that are poorly accounted for or perhaps even contradict an idea. The reasons for this are
varied and detailed, but the crux of the matter is that comprehensive ideas are not discarded simply
because some pieces do not fit. Many historical examples can be found where contradictory data did not
result in abandonment of ideas that we today accept as good science.
When well-established science knowledge is faced by apparently refuting evidence, the far greater
likelihood is that the problem lies with the seemingly disconfirming instance or instances. For example, in
the nineteenth century, scientists noted that observations of Uranus’ orbit departed significantly from that
predicted by Newton’s gravitational law. While some scientists at the time speculated that the law of
gravity might not apply at the distance of Uranus, most scientists, noting the enormous success of the
Newtonian framework in other affairs, rightfully expected the anomaly to be accounted for without
abandoning or modifying Newton’s law. In 1835, years after the anomaly in Uranus’ orbit was first
recognized, the return of Halley’s comet sparked the idea that celestial bodies beyond Uranus might exert
a force on the planet large enough to explain the planet’s orbital discrepancy. This confidence, rather than
seeing the anomaly as falsifying a well-supported idea, was key in the prediction and discovery of
Neptune in 1846. This and other stories illustrate that apparently disconfirming evidence can, in time,
usually be explained in terms of previously well-established knowledge. However, at other times, wellestablished prior ideas have, however reluctantly, been modified or abandoned.
Hypothesis, Laws and Theories are Different, Yet Related Kinds of Knowledge
The words “theory,” “law,” and “hypothesis” are frequently used in science classes, yet their appropriate
meaning and relationship is rarely conveyed to students. Outside of science, the word “theory” is often
interpreted as a “guess” or “speculation.” And many people wrongly think that hypotheses become
theories and then laws as the certainty of the idea increases. However, while laws and theories are related
to one another in complex ways, one never becomes the other. Laws are generalizations or universal
relationships that express the way that the natural world behaves under specific conditions. Scientific
theories predict and explain laws, and provide a kind of road map for further research. Not only are laws
not a higher form of scientific knowledge, but an understanding of laws is incomplete without a theory to
explain them. Consider, for example, that we have a law of gravity, but no well-established theory that
explains why bodies are attracted to one another.
The scientific community’s confidence in ideas concerning the natural world can range from speculative,
gaining support, well supported, to near certain (but not proven truth!). Ideas that are speculative or are
gaining support, but are not yet well-established are often referred to as “hypotheses.” Note that
“hypothesis” can mean a guess or a well-informed speculation, and these two meanings might refer to a
particular instance (an observation), a universal relationship (law), or an explanatory framework (theory).
Hence, the word “hypothesis” has at least six different meanings. Speculative explanatory frameworks
(theories) may, over time, become well established, but they are still theories. Speculative invariable
relationships (laws) may also become well established, but they remain laws. Scientific theories and laws
are different kinds of knowledge with different purposes. Thus, as evidence for a theory grows, it
becomes better established, but it remains a theory.
Science Provides Natural Explanations for Phenomena
Scientific knowledge must, in principle, be testable. This means that obtaining direct evidence for or
against a claim must be possible. Because science limits itself to testable ideas, explanations deferring to
supernatural forces are not used in science. This stance is referred to as “methodological naturalism”.
Most of us adopt this stance in our everyday lives, even though we might believe in a supernatural being.
Imagine that your car mechanic tells you your car won’t start because it is possessed by an evil spirit.
Most of us would demand a second opinion! Importantly, because science limits itself to naturalistic
evidence and explanation, it is incapable of addressing questions regarding the supernatural – science
simply cannot address these kinds of questions. You might think of science and religion like playing two
different games – different means are used to reach each game’s respective goals.
Science sets out to understand the natural world in ways that human beings can comprehend and then
manipulate through technology. This approach to explaining natural phenomena without reference to the
supernatural has undeniably been successful and has provided scientific explanations for phenomena that
in the past were attributed solely to supernatural intervention. Future efforts will undoubtedly result in
even more powerful explanations that make no reference to the supernatural.
The scientific community’s demand for empirical evidence and naturalistic explanations, in part, account
for its success at establishing reliable knowledge about the world. However, these demands also set up
boundaries that preclude it from investigating or making claims about what matters most to people. For
instance, matters of spirituality, morality, and the meaning of life are not amendable to scientific
investigation. One commentator wrote that “The fact that science cannot find any purpose to the universe
does not mean there is not one. We are free to construct parables for our moral edification…”.
Importantly, science does not and cannot deny the existence of the supernatural. In their personal lives,
many scientists have a deep faith in a God, but when they do science they work to understand our world
and the universe in naturalistic terms, the same as with researchers who look for a non-supernatural cause
for disease. Explanations using supernatural events and/or deities are beyond nature and, thus, beyond the
realm of science. The word “supernatural” means beyond nature. Science deals with the natural world
and, consequently, scientific explanations must be based in natural expressions with no reference to the
supernatural. Science and religion are like two different games with different rules and goals.
Doing Science is a Social and Collaborative Process
A scientist once said that if science really worked like the media and school science often portray, no one
would be a scientist. One of the most common misconceptions of science and scientists is that of the
solitary and introverted investigator working in a drab laboratory. Of course, at times a scientist may find
her or himself working alone, but that’s the case in most any career. Most of the time, though, scientists
work with others in all sorts of settings—in nature doing field research, in the laboratory, and in the
meetings common to all careers. Scientists must work together and do so in all aspects of research.
Solving problems is more productive and enjoyable when collaborating with others, and most scientific
problems are far too complex, time consuming, and demanding of resources to work alone.
1. What ideas about the characteristics of science surprised you?
2. What new insight about science and scientists did you learn from this reading?